• Time to tighten up: UConn has annually prided itself on the ability to disrupt the opposing team’s best offensive player. However, with the loss of defensive stopper Kelly Faris to graduation and the decision to play more full-court defense to take advantage of the speed of their guards, the Huskies have given up more open looks from the perimeter than in past years. On the recently-completed road trip, UConn allowed Central Florida’s Briahanna Jackson to score 28 points and Memphis’ Ariel Hearn to score 20 points. While Houston don’t have an offensive threat as productive as Jackson and Hearn, improving the perimeter defense is a major priority.

• Hartley eyeing another milestone: Senior guard Bria Hartley moved into the top 15 on UConn’s scoring list in the last game and has a chance to become the 14th UConn player to record 200 steals if she comes up with four steals against Houston.

Scott takes control: Wade Scott, who has been an assistant coach at Houston for the last eight seasons, became the interim head coach on Dec. 21 when Todd Buchanan resigned due to personal reasons. Scott’s second coaching stint was at Yale. No, not the university, but as the boys’ head basketball coach at Yale High School in Yale, Okla.

• Good bloodlines: Houston sophomore guard Bianca Winslow is daughter of former Houston men’s basketball star Rickie Winslow who played on the Cougars squad that reached the 1984 national championship game. Rickie Winslow is still in the top 10 on Houston’s career scoring list. Bianca Winslow is averaging 2.3 points in eight games this season.

STORRS >> Other than a pesky cold, which has robbed Moriah Jefferson of most of her voice, things couldn’t be much better for the UConn sophomore point guard these days.

Jefferson will get to see close friend Alecia Smith, a sophomore guard for Houston, when the Cougars face the top-ranked Huskies on Tuesday (7 p.m., SNY) in just the second game in the last 5½ weeks at Gampel Pavilion.

Both sophomores are making an impact. Jefferson needs three assists to surpass the total she had in 39 games as a freshman and is fast approaching her scoring output from a season ago. Smith is Houston’s leader with 16 3-pointers and the Cougars’ sixth-leading scorer.

“We were best friends growing up. We played for the same team, and we were both point guards,” said Jefferson, who first starting playing with Smith when she was in fifth grade. “She plays really hard, especially on the defensive end and that is something to watch for. She doesn’t start, but she gets in and plays a lot of minutes.”

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As excited as Jefferson is to see her old friend, she is downright giddy about the upcoming nationally-televised game at Baylor on Monday when Jefferson will be able to play in front of friends and family in her native Texas for the only time this season.

“I didn’t get home for Christmas, so it will be nice my whole family,” Jefferson said.

“I am excited. I get to play close to home, and when we played (Texas) A&M last season, it was kind of the same feeling.”

There’s a chance that Jefferson could be one of the players asked to defend Baylor All-American guard Odyssey Sims, who is the nation’s leading scorer with an average of 30.9 points per game.

“I will play anybody,” said Jefferson, who played in the same powerhouse DFW Elite AAU program as Sims. “Odyssey is a great player, and I played Odyssey a bunch of times. Even going back home, we still play a lot. We play all the time.”

If Jefferson has one wish, it would be that she gets her voice back before returning home.

“We are making jokes that she sounds like a little Michael Jackson or Smokey Robinson,” UConn sophomore forward Morgan Tuck said of Jefferson’s voice, “It is barely there pretty much.”

There are still two games left before UConn faces Baylor.

Houston enters the game on its third three-game losing streak of the season and with just one double-digit scorer. Add in the fact that Houston is led by an interim coach, and this one could be over early.

“It is a lot to ask anybody anytime especially during the season,” Auriemma said of the task interim coach Wade Scott is currently facing. “He’s been there for a while, and he knows the system little bit. They are struggling a little bit trying to find their way.”